Daughter of Smoke and Bone

I’ve seen this title coming through the library for a while and I’ve avoided it. I’m almost too embarrassed to tell you why, now that I’m neck deep in it and totally crazy about it. Okay, with the truthiness now. The cover annoyed me. I don’t like that mask that the chica has on, and yes I understand what the mask is supposed to represent, but the mask is bad. Who did the art work on that one? Seriously? Es no bueno.

Otherwise though, great story. Extra super compelling. I love a punky kind of leading lady and a goth best friend. Hilarious duo those two, with really excellent dialogue.

The writing about the cities, especially Prague, was also excellent. I definitely felt a lot of wanderlust while reading this book, Taylor does a very good job of putting you right in the middle of a city (even one you’ve not yet visited).

There are only a couple of nagging problems with this story. I am always annoyed with angels. Sorry angel people, I know you love your angel fiction, but I think it’s dumb. Unless it’s in Supernatural, then maybe we can talk about it. I just don’t get it! Why are angels sexy now? Ugh. I’m so old I guess that we’ve run through the regular gambit of supernatural creatures and have to move onto celestial ones. Frankly the chimera were much more interesting, except…

UGH. Okay. I recently read this book, Revealing Eden. Have you read it? It’s not great. Anyhow, maybe I’m just feeling hyper-sensitive to this kind of thing right now because of the blatant racism in RE, but what is the deal with the bigotry in Daughter? Why does “high human” even have to be a thing? If I were a beast I would think that human forms would be less desirable – especially if my mortal enemy looked like a human with wings? So what’s the deal? It stands to reason that deer head would be much preferable to one that looked like the dudes I have spent my whole life trying to wipe off the face of the other-earth. Bah. I don’t know wtfbbq, but it’s something that really bugged me.

*sigh*

Okay. Aside from those couple of faults, this is a really fun read. The ‘verse that Taylor has created is a really excellent one and the mythos involved therein is really well thought out and has few holes (except for what is mentioned above). So if you’re like me and have been putting this title off because the cover annoyed you get thee to the library to check it out, dig in and enjoy!